Jamie Harper is a UK-based theatre director, play designer and performance researcher. He studied English Literature at the University of Sheffield and trained on the Directors’ Course at LAMDA. He is a previous winner of the JMK Directors’ Award and the National Theatre Cohen Bursary for which he was Resident Director at the National Theatre Studio. His theatre credits include The Hundred We Are at The Yard Theatre; Heaven in Berlin at Testbed1; The Return of Colmcille for Derry’s UK City of Culture Festival; La Turista: Cafe Duende at Morito Tapas; Roundabout at The Bush Theatre; Invasion for Tooting Arts Club (Time Out Critics' Choice); Our Town at the Rose Theatre, Kingston; Beyond the Pale at Southwark Playhouse; A Real Humane Person Who Cares and All That at the Arcola; Invisible Storms at the Cock Tavern (Time Out Critics' Choice); The Six-Days World at The Finborough; The Things Good Men Do at the Lyric Hammersmith and A Lie of the Mind at BAC.
In 2013, he received a Winston Churchill Trust Travelling Fellowship to research the intersection of game design and drama at University of Miami. Following this project, he has focused on creating participatory performance works that incorporate play, including: Archipelago, The Lowland Clearances and The City Limits for Camden People's Theatre; People Vs Democracy at the Free Word Centre; Nudge, which was the runner-up for Headlong Theatre’s 2016 Digital Artist Award; Washing Machine at the Baltic Centre for Contemporary Art; Here is the Place for Serpentine Galleries (with Adam James); I Declare At My Own Risk at the Turner Contemporary (with Alina Serban) and Migrations of Cool at the Arebyte Gallery in Hackney Wick. Most recently he has focused on play projects related to ecological themes, including The Food Telescope (with Aslaug Ullerud) for the Oslo Architecture Triennale and Green Gold, a board-game commissioned by Fern, a Brussels-based pressure group advocating for forest restoration.
He is an active member of the Nordic Larp (live action role-play) community and has presented larp works at festivals including Grenselandet in Oslo, Blackbox CPH in Copenhagen and Minsk Larp Festival in Belarus. He has recently completed a practice-led PhD in participatory performance at Newcastle University and currently works as a lecturer and researcher in performance at the University of Chester.
Elien Hanselaer works as an actor and theatre-maker in United Kingdom and Belgium. She studied acting at School of Arts/KASK (Belgium) and East 15 acting school. In September 2018, Elien started an artistic, practise-based research on actor-actor connection at Queen's University Belfast. The research looks at how performers connect, how they can connect better and what kind of different theatre can be made from a radically changing methodology based on co-performer empathy. Elien focusses on the feminine aspect of theatre, seeking ritual, spirituality and community in her work. Pursuing the idea of making theatre that is involved in the world we live in, Elien recently got invested in teaching and leading community-building theatre arts projects.
Elien was awarded the Northern Bridge award to fund her research in co-performer empathy in 2018. She dances butoh and Argentine Tango. The dance forms have a strong influence on her work.
FOUNDERS Hobo was founded by Jamie Harper, Hugo Thurston and Tiffany Wood:
Hugo Thurston, Producer/Actor Hugo Trained as an actor at The Poor School. Theatre includes The French Lieutenant's Woman (National Tour), Quartermaine's Terms (National Tour), A Slight Ache (The Gate), and Friends Uninvited (Esk Valley Theatre Company). He was a founder member of Humphrey Carpenter's Mushy Pea Theatre Company with writing and acting credits on Babes (Shaw Theatre) and Mr Majeika (Chipping Norton Theatre). He was also a founder member of Toughpoint Theatre Company, formed to fulfill a commission from the Oxfordshire Health Authority to produce a touring adaptation of Diary of a Teenage Health Freak. More recently he joined Sturdy Beggars Theatre Company and produced the highly successful Princess Ivona and The Wolf (both at Network Theatre). For Hobo Theatre he has produced Roundabout (Bush Theatre); La Turista: Cafe Duende (Morito Tapas); Heaven in Berlin (Testbed1) and Hunger (E5 Bakehouse).
Tiffany Wood, Writer/Actor Tiffany Wood read English at Durham University and later trained in Paris with Philippe Gaulier where she studied devising, writing and directing, as well as performing. In 2004 Tiffany and her writing partner were awarded the Sunday Times Playwriting Award for their play Shaking Cecelia, which went on to tour Europe. Tiffany has extensive experience of devising and collaborative theatrical creation, with credits for En Masse Theatre Company and London Quest. Tiffany is currently working on a screenplay with her writing partner, and has two stage plays in development. She has recently completed an MA in Playwriting at Goldsmiths College. For Hobo Theatre, Tiff has written Roundabout, the company's debut show at the Bush Theatre in 2012.
And... We've also been fortunate to work with lots of other talented folk including:
Designers Florence McHugh, Moi Tran, Alice Hodge, Emma Robinson and Bern Roche Farrelly Lighting Designers Fridjthjofur Thorsteinsson and Josh Pharo Sound Designers Josh Richardson and Marianna Roe Musicians Andrei Ionescu and Ollie Pash Production Managers Ria Samartzi and Sam Gosling Movement Director Alexandra Baybutt and Fight Director Rebecca Perret Actors: Katherine Manners, Karen Archer, Sally-Anne Badger, Jack Blackburn, Eleonora Cuciarelli, Meredith Bartmon, Harriet Layhe, Amelie Edwards, Rob Taylor-Hastings, Hayley Adams, Barry McStay, Harriet Green, Brendan Jones, Mariam Haque, Hilda Peter, Bogdan Silaghi, Marco Petrucco, Laura O'Keefe, Sophie Brittain, James Barbour, Alin Balascan, Catherine Rowney, Emma Connell, Ida Bonnast, Simon Yadoo, Violet Ryder, Richard Atwill, Rhian Marston-Jones, Alina Serban, James Meunier, Ian Bailey, Annabel Capper, Boris Mitkov, Heather Nimmo, Luke Shepherd, Amelia Sweetland, Adam Bellamy, Natasha Vieira, Laurie Harrington, Chloe Todd, Rosie Abraham, Helen Liggat.....plus lots of others who helped with workshops...thank you all!